Beauty and the Beast
by Violet911
Summary: A handsome boy mistaken as a girl, a curse on a grand castle and the people within, a monster hungry for everything he wants and a lost love soon to be found. A story-style parody of Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" filled with love, laughs, and PASTA !


**A/N: Bonjour, mes ami~! ****I had a dream like this once and it got me inspired to make a Disney's Beauty and the Beast themed Hetalia fan fiction. This is written in a story format so it'll be much more detailed and less singing, sadly. Some (maybe most) of the dialogue, point of view, scenes and plotline will be change from the movie and I still have to keep some of them in character, but the main context is there.**

**And later, you'll find out who the main pairing is, which will be pretty obvious when the nation playing as Belle is introduced. So, I'll leave this up to you people out there over the fourth wall.**

**I know, I'm practically following other writers who attempted to do this kind of crossover, but I vow in the name of PASTA that I will finish this! *le gasps can be heard***

**Perhaps next time, I'll crossover Disney with one of my other favourite anime. *in the background, evilly plotting fictional people's demise, especially book characters***

**Disclaimer: I do not own anything you've seen or heard from the media.**

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><p><em><span>Introduction:<span>_

_Once upon a time, in a faraway land, a young prince lived in a shining castle. Although he had everything his heart desired, the prince was spoiled, selfish, and unkind. But then, one winter's night, an old beggar woman came to the castle and offered him a single rose in return for shelter from the bitter cold. Repulsed by her haggard appearance, the prince sneered at the gift and turned the old woman away, but she warned him not to be deceived by appearance, for beauty is found within. And when he dismissed her again, the old woman's ugliness melted away to reveal a beautiful enchantress. The prince tried to apologize, but it was too late, for she had seen that there was no love in his heart, and as punishment, she transformed him into a hideous beast, and placed a powerful spell on the castle, and all who lived there. Ashamed of his monstrous form, the beast concealed himself inside the castle, with a magic mirror as his only window to the outside world. The rose she had offered truly an enchanted rose, which would bloom until his twenty-first year. If he could learn to love another, and earn the other's love in return by the time the last petal fell, then the spell would be broken. If not, he would be doomed to remain a beast for all time. As the years passed, he fell into despair, and lost all hope, for who could ever learn to love a beast?_

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><p>Chapter 1: This Provincial Town<p>

At the edge of a simple town, there stood a small house that held two residents, a man and his grandson, with barn animals under its roofand a water-powered mill on the side of the porch. Sunlight lit up the comfortable home and soft breeze rushed in through the windows. That single breeze reached a certain open room, which blew the overnight flame from a used candle that was sitting on a table with the grandson.

Not that it mattered. The morning sun was shining on the pages so the fire was no longer needed for him to read the last words of the story.

_And they all lived happily ever after. The End._

The young lad, in a maturing age of twenty, sighed as he closed his latest book. There was a smile etched on his face, however, for this temporary occurrence meant he could borrow another one.

Too keen to take even a little rest from that reading in one whole night,he placed his borrowed book inside his home-made basket hanging from his left arm as he managed to grab his brown vest from the hook over his white long-sleeved, wrinkled polo shirt before storming out onto the road towards town with exceptional speed.

With auburn hair and side swirling-curl flowing through the breeze, the boy never felt so excited to go into town. It was always so boring for him when he watches the people do their usual daily lives. But, when it comes to books (and his secret liking for pasta), he will surely be an ecstatic person to see.

No matter how the townsfolk view him as.

As his foot stepped on neutral ground, he heard the people open their shutters to let the morning sun in and greet each other, like always. Men walked merrily through the streets. Mothers tried to hold on to their children in a desperate attempt for control while trying to purchase their next meal. Sheep wandered around the square, specifically near the old water fountain where they always have a cool drink, with their shepherd behind their fluffy tails.

Feliciano breathed in the fresh air with wide stretched arms, recognizing how it is every day in this provincial life.

Repeating to himself that there has got to be more to life than _this_.

Shaking his thoughts away, he strolled into the crowd as he headed for the bookshop.

"Good morning, Felicia," the stout baker spoke and waved as the chestnut-haired boy happened to pass by the bakery. At the scent of those freshly baked bread and rolls on the tray the baker was holding, he skipped over there, hoping to strike a conversation where it might give him an opportunity to grab a roll and clear a misunderstanding.

A very big one, by some degree.

"Morning, monsieur," Feliciano replied back, the cheerfulness in his strange voice possibly supporting the long-known misunderstanding.

The baker looked up and down on the lad's outfit with a weary expression. He tipped his white hat with his index finger and thumb then crossed his arms on the counterafter placing the tray away, muttering in hushed tones."Still wearing men's clothing, I see. You shouldn't satisfy your grandfather for fulfilling his lies. I know you are proud that he was once the best hunter in this town, but a small lady like you can't satisfy that old manby becoming one of his tell-tales that his grandchild is actually male just because he is now reduced to an inventor."

The said _male_ raised a finger. "About that, ah, I really am a b—"

"Well, the pants do suit you, strangely," the baker cut in, looking at Feliciano's matching brown pants while tapping a finger on his chin. Then, the older man decided to change the subject, maybe seeing that this was making the boy a bit uncomfortable. "So, where are you off to?"

Sadly because of the distraction with books, he completely forgot what they were talking about and said, "The bookshop! I just'a finished the most wonderful story, about a beanstalk and an ogre and . . ."

The baker immediately ignored him, probably from the mention of books and the rush of customers. "That's nice . . ." He paced back inside, yelling, "Marie, the baguettes! Hurry up!"

Shaking his head, Feliciano left the bakery and decided not to talk to anyone else to day except for the bookseller. However, he was unaware that at the very moment he was the topic of the town.

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><p>Oh, how the people love to gossip. They mix the fact with the false so they're always mistaken. Whenever someone tells the truth, they think it's a lie. And whenever someone tells a lie, they take it as the truth. Yes, this how their system works.<p>

But when it involves the grandchild of Romulus, most of the known fake rumours are partially true.

"Look there goes that strange girl again," the local folk whispered and pointed as Feliciano innocently sauntered on with a wide smile. "Always dazed and distracted, with her books and her long-lost grandpapa."

A woman having a trim in the barber shop peered through the window. "You know, I've noticed that she has no particular group of friends."

The barber did a cross between a snort and a chuckle, taking huge snips on the lady's tresses while his eyes followed the child-like citizen. "You just noticed this now, mademoiselle? Of course that youth has no friends. Isn't sociable, voices out those absurd babbles with that equally absurd voice, and has 's head stuck in the clouds."

Some crowd observing Feliciano overheard the conversation between the barber and his customer, and immediately agreed with curious cock of an eyebrow.

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><p>Feliciano, jumping on the back of a moving wagon and hanging off from the side, looks around the small village in surveillance. Yes, many were all stuck in a huge rut of this ordinary life.<p>

Oh, maybe if they tasted the delicious pasta made from his grandpa's home country, they might at least get their existence in this world a bit more exciting.

Not noticing, the road suddenly got bumpy and the pensive boy lost his grip on the wagon. His feet staggered on the pavement and his arms flailing around, trying to find balance from that sudden jerk in the cart. However, after realizing that he reached his destination, he let the side of his face meet the ground as his eyes concentrated on one building.

The bookshop.

Feliciano got up from the earth, checked if the book was still in his basket, and hurried to get inside, still very oblivious of the stares he was given for his clumsiness.

He opened the door and was greeted by the sight of the books. Shelves of them, all lined up in alphabetical order by the dusty wall. Old and new, thick and thin, big and small, he loved them all. Being in the presence of books led him different times and places with different stories. It was a mean of escape for the growing lad.

And then there was the bookseller, who was a very closefriend of his. The man, wearing a divide-and-comb-to-the-left-side hairstyle, had his back on the adolescence while he was organizing some books and did not even notice his entry.

Feliciano cracked a smile at this. It is always hard to catch the attention of the bookseller, since he too like the boy was always preoccupied by the swarming thoughts contained in his brilliant mind, but for a different reason. Though he owns a bookshop, the owner's real dream in life was to create music that will touch the hearts in all the people of this country.

Maybe, even the whole world.

Nevertheless, Feliciano would not know this for sure since the aristocratic gentleman often shuts himself with the surrounding shelves of books. Yet, the boy can tell. He was not sure why the man doesn't pursue his dream and leave the village with the money he owns, but young one can tell that he wants to.

So badly.

With one creaking step from Feliciano's long black boots, the man turned around with both the sides of his glasses and dark brown hair glinting purpleat a brief moment when the light glazed over his head. The curly strand located at his hairline bobbed slightly as he smiled wholeheartedly at the moment he saw the young man at the doorway.

Yes, Roderich Edelstein was one of the rare few people who knew his real gender. He was like a father to him, actually; someone who really understood the youth's train of thought.

"Ah, Feliciano," Roderich welcomed, approaching to shake the boy's hand. Feliciano stepped forward and grasped the other's hand with a pat on the shoulder.

"Good morning," he replied, showing all his pearly-whites. The man chuckled and ushered him to sit on the wooden chair by the reading table, which he happily obliged. Feliciano carefully dropped his basket on the floor and sat down as Roderich went to the next room and brought out some fresh steaming hot bread from the oven.

Feliciano sniffed the golden-brown bread with hunger in the grumble of his empty belly after Mister Edelstein, a title he secretly calls Roderich because for saying it in public will be a little too formal and superior for the standards of an ordinary bookshop keeper. The older man went round the table to reach the basket by Feliciano's chair. He took out the small book and waved it at the boy while the naïve one munched his breakfast.

"Returning the book you borrowed, I see," he muttered, flipping through the pages then placing it back on its respective shelf carved on the bottom with the words FANTASY. He turned back to the boy. "Finished already?"

After some furious chewing and swallowing, the replied with a wide smile, "Ve, I couldn't put it down! Have you got anything new?"

Roderich laughed even more, taking the now empty plate on the table. "Not since yesterday, which you just borrowed and returned today."

Feliciano stood up and climb the ladder of the bookshelves. "That's alright. I'll borrow . . ." His finger traced along the spines of lined up books. When he found the book he was looking for, he took it out and said, "This one."

His friend waved his hand to bring the chosen book to his palm and readjusted his glasses to read the title. An incredulous yet amused look appeared on his face. "That one? But you've read it twice."

"Ve~, it's my favourite!" he stated happily, swinging of the side of the ladder and rolling down its track with one hand guiding the way while the other clinging to a bar. "Far off places, daring swordfights, magic spells, a prince in disguise!"

"Well, if you like it that much," he sighed, looking down at the perfectly worn-out book before handing it back to Feliciano with a knowing beam, "it's yours!"

The young man was surprised at the book he was holding and the man who gave it to him. "But, sir—"

Mister Edelstein raised a palm. "I insist!"

"Well, thank you," he cried, his eyes starting to water. "Thank you ve—"

But he was cut off by the sight of men peering through the bookstore's window. When the fellows saw him staring back, they ran off in a hurry, like they were never there. That dampened the mood of the enthusiastic soul. His head tilted forward as he fingered the spine of his new book.

Roderich understandably knew what the boy was thinking and clamped him on the shoulder to catch his attention. The disturbed Feliciano gazed up and wiped the sad tears that was about to roll down his red cheeks with his collar.

"Chin up, Feliciano Vargas," the wise man said, tapping his own chin with the back of his right hand as an example. "Keep your dignity intact. Being you isn't anything to be ashamed off."

Feliciano nodded and smiled half-heartedly with a sniff. He remembered the words he's supposed to say whenever he's in this kind of situation. "I . . . am a boy." He curled his fingers into a ball and placed his fist in front of his chest. "I . . . am a MAN!"

"You certainly have your grandfather's pride," Roderich mused, dusting off the dust on the boy's shoulders, "and a very big secret."

Unexpectedly, Feliciano frowned and grabbed his shirt in distress. "You didn't tell anyone, did you?"

Shaking his head in reply, the man patted his head and beamed to calm him down. "Now, why would I betray an upstanding lad like you?"

He smiled back and gave him a hug. He felt the older one stiffen and he let go immediately. Mister Edelstein was never a man good with affectionate actions.

Perhaps he will have to change that fact, someday.

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><p>Feliciano grabbed his basket and waved goodbye with the book held in his left hand as he was halfway out the door. Even though he was already gone, the bookseller still waved at the direction where the boy was, recalling a distant memory long buried in his mind . . .<p>

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><p>Opening the book, Feliciano held it up to his face and read the first chapter for the third time while walking towards the town square. Dozens of eyes were practically watching his every move as the bookworm manoeuvred through every obstacle in his path without even taking his nose out of the pages. The minds of the people were piling up thoughts about the peculiar <em>girl <em>between the lines of '_Is she feeling well?'_ and '_She must be in some fantasy world from all that book reading to channel such magic to avoid even a single pebble'._

Feliciano sat down at the edge of the fountain, ignoring reality as he knows it and only letting the sheep that were taking rests in the square in on the great story concealed in the printed paper.

"This is my favourite part," he told the sheep, pointing at a certain page without noticing that the sheep were only interested on the paper and not their contents. "It's where an ordinary girl, the main character of the tale, meets Prince Charming, but she won't know that he's the prince 'til the third chapter."

When Feliciano withdrew his book from the sheep's biting distance, the hat seller and his customer marvelled his beauty and grace as he read on silently.

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><p>"Did you hear," his customer whispered as she tried on another hat from the shelves, "that Felicia's other name is Bella? I must say it has to be since she says it every time she sees a pretty lady like herself. But unlike the others, she upholds her name with that charming face."<p>

The salesman rolled his eyes as the woman he was selling his products to accidentally knocked off her wig when she placed a different trilby on her now-barren scalp, not that the wig she was wearing was convincing in the first place. Holding a mirror higher for the woman to see her reflection, he replied in a rather pretentious tone, "A striking young woman, yes, but with outlandish hobbies and activities? Isn't that reasonably an unusual combination? She's different one, all right."

The wealthy woman just shrugged nonchalantly as she searched her bag to pay for her chosen sunhat. However, before she handed over a piece of her wealth, a gunshot was heard somewhere nearby though it echoed along the walls inside the shop as the coins spilled across the wooden floor.

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><p>An innocent goose, flying overhead in a V-formation with his flock, was shot out of the sky and plummeted towards the earth. A local villager, clutching a stuffed toy white bear on one hand and a potato sac with the other, ran over to the assumed spot where the goose will fall, and held out the bag, missing to catch the early morning kill by a foot to the side. Hoping that no one would see his mistake, he quickly stuffed the goose into the sac and hurried back to the hunter who took the bird's life.<p>

Leaning on a wall, atall, strong and handsome brutewith his gun tiltingat his side grinned behind the shadows, watching the only person in town not bothering to pay attention to his awesomeness as his lackey collected his kill. The man's gaze broke off at the sound of exhausted panting coming closer and closer to him. His head faced forward to find a wavy light flaxen-haired bespectacled boy, havinga hair curling down at the middle of his hairline, crouching with his head down and both his hands containing items at the position of his knees.

The blonde boy lifted his head having a bright smile when he breathlessly said, "Wow! You didn't miss a shot, Gilbert! You're the greatest hunter in the whole world!"

"I know," the albino smirked, stepping out of the shadows, eyes glowing with pride. The hunter was wearing a red long-sleeved puffy shirt that matched his eyes, black long trousers with the ends tucked in dark brown boots accompanied by an equally brown leather gloves. The boy could practically hear the sighs of affection around them for the upstanding figure that is Gilbert.

"No beast alive stands a chance against you," he continued to praise, standing up straight and glancing over the local town's hero's shoulder to find the source of the yearning sounds, a trio of beautiful blonde women —"Maple!"— staring at Gilbert's back in a fair distance, "and no girl, for that matter."

Abruptly, Gilbert pulled the boy closer, his left arm wrapping aroundthe shoulders, and said, "It's true, Matthew, and I've got my sights set on that one!" while pointing at a reading Feliciano sitting on the fountain's edge.

Matthew's face slowly twisted in horror, completely oblivious to his role model. In all his time trusting every word coming out of the man everyone admires, Matthew couldn't believe what Gilbert has announced. He wanted Feliciano, a male. A MALE!

Though the town they all live in is quite small, Matthew was often ignored and forgotten but that gave an advantage of him seeing the unseen. He knows lots of things, especially the truth of about Romulus' grandchild. It wasn't hard to tell, actually. The voice, the clothing, the sudden growth spurt, and the lack of . . .

Matthew coughed involuntarily at the thought about a certain external organ in the body located at the chest area. He remembered that he still needed to reply, but there was no rush seeing that Gilbert was grinning maliciously at Feliciano's direction, stuck in some kind of dream state.

It was really alarming in Matthew's part since he's hanging out with him. He never guessed that his hero would gullible be as the rest of them, thinking that Feliciano was a woman. In all honesty, the blonde one openly admired the skilled huntsman and was very happy when Gilbert took him under his wing, earning some attention from the people for being at his side. He thought that Gilbert was best at everything. Alas, he lacked brains and hardly ever a thinker, just fighter. This was actually expected but Matthew never took that fact in his heart. He believed that Gilbert was smart enough to know the difference between male and female, and he was going to make that statement into a reality.

He's going to tell him the truth.

_But do it gently, dude, _a near voice advised him. _You wouldn't want to put him in shock, so drop a few hints._

"The inventor's son?" Matthew questionedweakly, snapping Gilbert out of his own thoughts, but sadly not wiping off the albino's grin.

"She's the one, Williams!" he said, not hearing Matthew's end of the question. Unwrapped his arm from him and stood awesomely. "The lucky girl I'm going to marry."

Gripping the hand of his stuffed toy, Matthew got more determined. "But _he's—_"

"The most beautiful girl in town," Gilbert cut in.

"I know but—"

"And that makes her the best," he stated. The man suddenly grabbed the boy's shirt and pulled him to his glaring look, making the glasses go in a slightly crooked position in the timid one's face. "And don't I deserve the best?"

Matthew got so nervous from the proximity between him and Gilbert that he spoke so quickly, his face glowing red by the second. "Well of course, I mean you do, but I mean . . ." But the silver-headed man let go of his lackey before he could finish the sentence, resulting to Matthew's face-full of dirt.

"Right from the moment I saw her, Birdie," he said wistfully (in a manly way), using the weird nickname he calls his follower, "I said she is equally beautiful as the awesome me. So you know what?"

"So, what?" he feebly asked, getting on all-fours just to spit the grass out of his mouth and readjust his glasses. Matthew glanced up to see Gilbert crouching down and watching over him with a wicked beam, his silvery hair glowing from the shinning sun covered behind his head.

"I'm making plans to take the vital regions of Felicia Bella Vargas! Legally, of course, through marriage," he declared simply and adding an after note, still grinning like the idiot he is, and not bothering to pay attention on how pale Matthew became from those simple yet ill-bred words.

Seeing that Feliciano go up from his seat and was heading towards him, Gilbert jumped up in full confidence, made an awesome pose that made the girls watching him scream, and then leaned back on the shadow wall casually after snatching the potato sac from Matthew's hands and stuffing inside his manly satchel.

However, Gilbert saw Feliciano go past him without looking up from his book. After a few seconds of thinking why she didn't notice him, he realized that the bookworm was already eaten by the crowd on her way to catch him, Gilbert jumped in and pushed through the sea of people, closely tailed by a shaken Matthew who just got up from the ground, but the villagers increased just to be a spectator at the unaware reader.

"I can't get to her, Birdie," Gilbert complained to Matthew,both stuck in between the body masses. Though while struggling to break free, the crimson-eyed man glanced at the building roofs and curled his mouth into a devious smirk. He turned back to his troubled follower, grinning, "Kesese~ I have an idea."

"Maple," the boy whimpered, sensing that it was a bad one.

The next thing Matthew knew, after managing to get out of the crowd by going back to where they started, he was slung over the shoulder and carried off to the roofs by Gilbert. He didn't know how the man managed it while holding by his left arm but the hunter climbed up using only the open windows of a building as his aid.

The sky was so near like it was in arm's reach when they got to the top, but Gilbert with Matthew looking over the shoulder stared down at the village's main road where Feliciano was walking, very ignorant of the people staring at him go.

"Um, could you drop me now, Gilbert?" Matthew asked meekly, staring down at the ground from their height while tightly grasping the hand of his bear, still on the shoulder of his idol though facing behind. "I could walk, you know, on the roof that is," he added, thinking the silver-haired man might _actually_ drop him off the ridge.

"Not taking any chances, Birdie," he proclaimed. Matthew felt the man shift and he knew immediately what he was going to do next. Soon enough, the albino started running and jumping on rooftops and ledges while supporting his passenger, luckily strong enough to handle their weight from being a factor in their might-be near deaths. Matthew had to use his toy to cover his face just so he couldn't see the earth every time Gilbert leaped across.

_Don't worry, man,_ that same familiar voice reassured, though somewhat in a shaky manner of speaking. _He'll stop eventually._

But it only got worse when Gilbert _did_ stop.

"Finally," sighed Matthew while blushing as he felt strong hands hold his waist, putting him in front of Gilbert with feet placed firmly on old ceramic roof tiles. That was first part of the problem. The second was that the lavender-eyed blonde didn't know that he was standing at the very edge of the rooftop, and that with one poke of an index finger belonging to a grinning huntsman some of the ceramic tiles will slip out of their place and tumble into a fortunate cart full of hay along with him.

However, that's how it happened. That was the series of unfortunate events for one Matthew Williams in that single hour of the day.

A person needn't to worry about the poor fellow. He was unhappily used to it by now.

Most likely, for he needed to be, for his final misfortune from his idol . . .

* * *

><p>After he helped his follower down, Gilbert awesomely took a leap of faith and dived right into the cart where the giddy boy still laid among the feed.<p>

Not one of his brightest ideas, that is for certain.

The hurtful collision of their bodies didn't even damper the pale man's mood, though, noticing Bella stopping for a moment during mid-fall to glace back in surprise at a crowd which dispersed quickly before she could register them ever being there. Gilbert quickly scrambled out of his awkward position with him being on top of the other, who was momentarily stunned from the sudden impact, and raced towards a distracted damsel. He luckily intervened by blocking her way before she could return to her book.

"Hello, Bella," he greeted, flashing his best smile with barring teeth to resist the urge to moan from the aching pain in his chest.

An amber eye trailed at his direction before returning to the page. "_Guten morgen,_ Gilbert," she replied, making the man's thoughts directed on how cute she sounds when she speaks in his main language.

_But, of course,_ he prided in his mind, _everyone knew I'm from an awesome place called Prussia._

It was a good thing that he was just thinking a short sentence, because his bride-to-be wastrying to escape him. It was easily prevented when he took the book out of her small hands and examined it for himself, wondering how pieces of paper gets more attention from her than him.

"Gilbert, may I have my book, please?" she requested innocently, holding out her hand while forming a clenched fist on her chest with the other.

"How can you read this?" he asked, hiding his real intentions as his hands posed the book in every angle possible and flipping a page once or twice. "There are no pictures!"

"Ve~, some people use their imaginations," she said with enthusiasm, grabbing her book in a nick of time before Gilbert had the chance to throw it somewhere far away, wearing a weird smile.

"Bella, it's about time you got your head out of your books," he said while grabbing the book once more, tossing it over his shoulder and into the mud, and before Bella could reach for it, Gilbert cleverly stepped on the object to firmly place it on the dirt, emphasis on his next sentence, "and paid attention to more important things."

He gave a pause to look down at his fair maiden who seemed to be in a verge of tears just trying to move his boot out of the way. Feeling a bit merciful for the super cute girl kneeling at his feet, he walked behind her, leaving a distinctive mark on the cover of the book.

"Like the awesome me," he said at last, making those three girls behind him swoon over on how great he is at everything.

"The whole town's talking about it," he continued, observing how nimble and careful the girl picks up the book and cleans the mud off the covering and some pages. Gilbert shook his head in exasperation. This lady sure is a weird one. "It's not right for a woman to read—soon she starts getting ideas . . . and thinking."

_Ja_, thinking was not part of his awesome master plan.

Tucking her book in her basket, she said with a smile, "Gilbert," in a tone the prize-fighter could put a finger on, "you are positively primeval."

The man couldn't help but be suppressed by a grin stretching up to his shinning ruby gaze at the funny yet beautiful girl.

"Why thank you, Bella," he answered, putting his hand around her shoulders.

Bella raised a finger. "Actually, I'm a mal—"

Not really interested, Gilbert hastily changed the course subject of the conversation. This mademoiselle was starting to get on his nerves, but showing his awesomeness will cure this confused girl. "Hey, whaddya say you and me take a walk over to the tavern and have a look at my hunting trophies."

Still, she was stubborn. After wiggling out of his grasp, she said, "Maybe some other time."

"Oh, come on," he exclaimed, prodding his own body with the gesture of his thumb. "I'm the awesomest man in this village, this country, maybe even the universe!"

She took a moment to look at her house perched on top of a hill before turning back to him. "Please, Gaston. I can't. I have to get home and help my grandfather."

Now, though the Gilbert is too awesome to use his head for a simple chat, he knew it's sailed to rocky waters.

The chat, not his head.

In Gilbert's opinion, the presumed Great Romulus is a total nutcase.

Rumour has it that he became that way because, when he disappeared during his hunt on the Dark Forest, he was killed off by someone and left for dead in the woods, but he was rescued later still holding on the last string of life by an enchantress, the keeper of the forest. However, she found out he is the one who kept killing off her animals and she placed a curse on him in exchange for his life.

She took half of his sanity and erased most of his memories.

_That's just a rumour though and no way can it be true,_ Gilbert mentally scoffed._ He was born a nutcase and was just lucky to kill off that many creatures. Then, his luck passed on to his cute daughter, his career went downhill and turned into an inferiorclueless inventor. Now, I'm the best hunter now and my wife should be a descendant of a previous great hunter as well. It's just a plus that she's cute~!_

Because he believes in this, obviously his followers had to believe it too, or risk knowing what's coming out the nose of his weapon if it's pointed at any of their vital regions. So, he was proud to say (in his head) that Matthew Williams, the clumsy quiet fool staggering out of the cart who he calls his Birdie, was the most loyal person in the whole town to Gilbert's awesome name for vouching for his beliefs.

Gilbert should've removed the word 'fool' from his previous thought, but it seemed more fitting after saying those said beliefs out loud, right in front of Bella.

"Ha, ha, ha," Williams laughed softly, still clutching his head and security object after that landing while walking towards Gilbert. He raised his head and the remaining glass on his eyewear fell to the floor, shattering into pieces not a second later.

Bella, being strangely kind to lowly people at random times, went forward and helped Matthew stand more upright. However, Matthew unfortunately mistook her for Gilbert and said in a barely audible volume, "That crazy old loon. He needs all the help he can get . . ."

The girl unhanded the muddled lad and the blonde fainted with a thud. The scene was so hilarious, it brought the albino to tears along with his hearty laugh and aching front. Unfortunately, for eyes were watered and his unique laugh filled his ears, he didn't notice the anger washing over the cute girl's face and was currently redirected at him, which just increased its appeal.

"Don't you talk about my grandpa that way," she chided, but there was some reluctance in her eyes. "I know this once-innocent boy got it from you. Everything he does now, he learns from you."

The white-haired man couldn't help but grin on how vulnerable Felicia looked. "Well, he does learn from the best, that Matthew." He chuckled, walking a step forward every time she stepped back.

Now, the fear was crystal clear in her auburn eyes as the sun's rays are reflected in the streams river, sensing the danger the more she tried to resist. After a few seconds, the girl's back met with a cemented wall and Gilbert placed both of his hands on the flat on the surface of the building, stopping her from escaping. His red gaze squinted down at the cornered girl to have a better look.

_Fear, danger, power and 's what he lives for._

"You gotta admit, the man's finally lost it from living through all those wild experiences," he maliciously in her ear, making her small body shiver. Just for a bit, until the emotional impact from the mockery of her grandfather kicked in.

Her glowing eyes glared as she retorted with conviction, "My grandpa is not crazy!" Then, she pushed Gilbert out of the way with strength he didn't know she contained.

It made him want her more. Beauty, smarts, and spunk. That's the kind of girl Gilbert Beilschmidt wanted.

But the moment of reverence was short-lived when they heard an unmistakable explosion from Bella's residence. Her expression turned back to fear, but with more intensity as a plume of black smoke puffed out of the chimney and the entrance to their basement. She left without another word.

Gilbert, after shaking out of his shock, stood up and walked up to a stirring Matthew on the ground beside his bear, still oddly snow-white even from all the times it has touched the muddy dregs of this poor town. He bent down and slapped the boy hard on the cheek. The eyelids snapped open and the head slowly lifted, its violet gaze was directed at the albino, containing emotions between shock and pain.

Or was that the same thing. Gilbert wasn't really sure, but he knew one thing for sure.

"We have a wedding to plan in one hour, Birdie," he explained in high spirits. The blonde's head slumped back, unconscious.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: And that's the end of the first chapter~! **

**I decided that Rome's human name could be from one of the founders' he was named after, Romulus. Not really original but I like the name.**

**If you didn't notice, I made a shout out to my favourite game. Try to guess what it is if you recognize the scene. **

**Yes, this is a bit different from a regular Beauty and the Beast story. It's crossed between the Disney-verse and the Hetaverse, sorta. There are also multiple pairings shown here. Pairings I could tolerate, so you'll probably see a lot of them. And you'll notice that the usual background characters later in the story (like the bookseller) will have a background stories connected to Feliciano so stay tuned.**

**That next chapter will be up probably in a month's time (hopefully). Until then, try to imagine what I have in store for these characters.**

**Violet911 is out! Peace~!**


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